The document discusses how coaching salaries have increased dramatically over time due to the immense trust and value placed in coaches. It also discusses how John Wooden earned a modest salary as a basketball coach compared to today's salaries in the millions. The rise in coaching pay is linked to changes in sports over the past century as amateur athletics have been replaced by highly professionalized and commercialized sports. This has directly impacted the role of coaches.
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Introduction
Legendary basketball coach John Wooden never made an annually salary of more than
$33 thousand dollars per year (Differences). This year, University of Kentucky Coach John
Calipari will earn a salary of $5.2 million dollars (Associated “John”). Why have coaches’
salaries increased so dramatically through the years? Because of the amount of trust placed
upon a coach, his value is immense. Economist Adam Smith’s ideas of the wage scale apply to
the pay of professional athletes, but his concept of wage based on trust is clearly seen in
coaching. Smith says:
Wages of labor vary according to the small or great trust
which must be reposed in the workmen….We trust our health to
the physician, our fortune and sometimes our life and reputation
to the lawyer and attorney. Such confidence could not safely be
reposed in people of a very mean or low condition. Their reward
must be such, therefore, as may give them that rank in the society
which so important a trust requires.
To put it simply, we value our coaches because of the assets we are paying them to care for;
our young athletes.
Coaching is an extremely difficult, time consuming career to be a part of. However, it is
also extraordinarily rewarding. As long as sports have existed there have been coaches, and no
matter how much sports change over the years, there will still be a need for coaches. For as long
as I can remember I have wanted to be a basketball coach. In writing this paper I attempted to
understand the essence of coaching, the knowledge of how to be the best coach I can possibly
be. To better understand today’s coach, we must first understand the changes in sports over the
past century. These changes, both economic and social, will help lead us to conclusion that
amateur athletics are rapidly being replaced by highly professionalized athletics. As we will see,
this change has a direct effect on how we must coach our athletes. This essay addresses the way
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in which social and economic factors have destroyed true amateur athletics, thus changing the
role of a coach. What are these changes, how have they come about, and how should an aspiring
young coach approach the profession?
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Neal Settle
LST 441: Senior Thesis
Dr. Elliott, Dr. Gale, Dr. Hendricks
12/13 /2013
A Century of Change: The Social and Economic Evolution of Sports in America,
and its Effect on Coaching
A century of Change
In the world of sports, there are two opposing opinions as to why we participate in
competitive athletics. The first opinion is “It doesn’t matter whether you win or lose, it’s how
you play the game.” This mind set is based on sportsmanship and competing to the best of one’s
ability. There is nothing wrong with this at all. In fact, some people believe that this is the best
part of playing sports. The second opinion is “You play to win the game!” This famous quote
from former NFL coach Herman Edwards sums up the point of view that we play sports to win,
not to have fun. Further, winning brings in money.
Which of these viewpoints is preferable? Are sports a means of enjoyment and social
interaction, or are they all about winning and making money? Could it be some mix of the two?
Over the past century, we have seen the evolution of sports from a mostly amateur, club-like
activity to a multi-billion dollar business. Sports have become a social necessity in generating a
win-at-all-costs mentality. Finally, we also may have seen the demise of the entire concept of
amateur sports. We must examine the effect of these changes on the mind of the individual is
examined.
Today’s sports are controlled by money. In our culture of instant gratification we feel as
if we have the right to buy whatever we want whenever we want it. This feeling is rampant in
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sports. We want our team to win, we want it to do so now, and hope for success next year is just
not good enough. If our appetites cannot be satisfied in a timely manner, then we want to fire the
coach, the general manager, and the athletic director. However, sports have not always been
controlled by money. We have seen a major shift in the economics of sports in the past century.
The story of Jim Thorpe presents an example of this shift.
Jim Thorpe, an American-Indian, was born on May 28, 1888 in Prague Oklahoma. He
was a tremendous athlete who excelled in track and field, and football while attending Carlisle
Indian school from 1907-1912. He was a natural at every sport that he competed in. The climax
of Thorpe’s sport’s career and consequently, his life, was winning two gold medals in the 1912
Summer Olympics. Following the Olympics, Thorpe played professional baseball for the Giants,
Cincinnati Reds, and Boston Braves. He then went on to play for several professional football
teams, and he was named the first president of the American Professional Football Association.
He capped of his sports career by being named top athlete of the first half of the twentieth
century (Flatter, 1-3).
However, this story of one of America’s all-time greatest athletes is not a totally happy
one. Thorpe played professional baseball during the summers of 1909 and 1910, earning the
tremendous some of two dollars a game! When this information came to light in 1913 he was
stripped of his amateur status, and more importantly, his two gold medals. Thorpe would then
bounce around from team to team, looking to earn his next paycheck playing either football or
baseball. Sadly, he was sometimes signed by a team to merely serve as a “gate attraction”
(Flatter, 2-3).
Perhaps the saddest part of Thorpe’s life was the one thing that every athlete must face at
some point: life away from the sports they love. Although he was one of the greatest athletes to
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ever live, Thorpe was not beyond the control of old age, and on November 30, 1928 he played,
and was totally ineffective in his last professional football game. Upon retiring from sports,
Thorpe had numerous odd jobs, and grew dependent upon alcohol. He died from a heart attack
alone, in his trailer, at the age of 64, a sad end to the life of one of the greatest athletes to ever
live (Flatter, 3).
Thorpe’s story underscores the economic shift in sports over the past century. While
playing professional baseball during the summers of 1909 and 1910 Thorpe made between $2 a
game and $35 a week (Flatter, 2). Then in 1915 he played two games for the Canton Bulldogs,
earning $250 a game (Flatter, 3). At first, these numbers may not seem very significant to the
casual fan. However, when compared to today’s salaries, they are simply unbelievable. Last
season the average salary for a Major League baseball player was $3,213,479 (Press 1). This
breaks down to close to $20,000 per game. In 2011 the average NFL salary was 1.9 million
dollars, which comes to roughly $125,000 per game (Dorish, 1). This means a 10,000% pay
increase per baseball game, and a 500% pay increase per football game. So, we can see that in
the past hundred years alone there has been an explosion in the average pay for our professional
athletes, but are these pay increases justified, and how might they affect the mind of the
individual entering the world of sports?
In today’s world of highly-paid athletes it is very common to hear the average fan
complaining about an athlete’s large salary, signing bonus, or endorsement deal. However, not
only do I believe that these large paychecks are fair, I believe that the athletes deserve every
penny of them. In The Wealth Of Nations, Adam Smith gives a list of five circumstances that
help to define the wage scale:
…first, the agreeableness or disagreeableness of the employments
themselves; secondly, the easiness and cheapness, or the difficulty
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and expense of learning them; thirdly, the constancy or
inconstancy of employment in them; fourthly, the small or great
trust which must be reposed in those who exercise them, and
fifthly, the probability or improbability of success in them.
Professional athletes match up very well to these five circumstances. First of all, people may
think an athlete’s job is easy or fun, but it is actually quite difficult. The long hours, high levels
of stress, and little job security make the profession very disagreeable, in Smith’s usage.
Secondly, the athlete’s trade is for the most part inherited, that is, the athlete is born an athlete.
So there is no real price of learning the trade, only practicing it. Thirdly, there is zero constancy
of employment for the athlete. Even highly paid professionals have little job security. Fourthly,
athletes have tremendous trust placed on their backs. Not only do they represent their owner,
franchise, and community with their actions, but their performance on the field directly affects
hundreds of other people who work within the organization. Finally, there is almost zero
probability of success in the field of professional athletes. There are a very small number of jobs
to fill and countless athletes who wish to fill them. If so few athletes ever make it to the
professional level then do sports really matter in a social context?
Sports play a major role in our social development as human beings. As children, sports
are one of the first ways which we make friends. In school, we are taught how to work hard,
function as a team, and to fight through adversity through sports. We have seen the economic
change, or explosion, in sports over the past century, but what social changes have taken place?
Among the numerous changes perhaps the most dramatic is the decline of America’s past time.
Baseball is dying. In recent years, other sports have overtaken it in popularity. What is
causing this decline? In some ways the game is quite healthy. The average MLB salary is a
hefty 3.31 million dollars a year, the game itself is much safer than football, soccer, or hockey,
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and the sport gets plenty of media exposure. However, one important aspect may provide an
explanation for the sports decline in popularity.
Last season, only 8% of Major League ball players were African American. This is less
than half of the 17% that were African American in 1959, the year the last team integrated its
roster (Nightengale, 1). The peak was 1975, when 27% of Major league baseball was composed
of African American players (Nightengale, 1). These numbers show exactly where baseball’s
problem is. This sport that is celebrated for being very racially integrated is close to losing a
third of its entire demographic.
So why is baseball dying out among African Americans? Take a walk through any inner
city neighborhood, park, or community center and what do you see being played? Basketball or
football are the popular options, and very seldom will you find baseball. There are several
reasons for this. The first is that baseball is logistically more difficult for inner city children to
play than other sports, such as basketball. It’s not that they are not smart. Rather, there simply is
not enough space, and sometimes not even enough players in the urban environment. Basketball
requires one ball and one hoop, no defender, no certain amount of space, not even a net.
Baseball takes a glove, ball, seventeen other players with equipment, four bases, and a space big
enough to play a game. With money being so tight in recent times, many parents may opt to
have their children play a cheaper game than baseball.
Another reason baseball is on the decline among African Americans is what they see on
television. Watch any baseball game, or commercial with baseball players in it, and you will
find that the majority of star players are either of Caucasian, or Hispanic background. There are
only a handful of what we would consider superstar caliber African American players. The most
alarming statistic was that at the beginning of last season there was only one African American
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player, Marlon Byrd, on either of Chicago’s big league teams (Nightengale, 2). Chicago has the
United States’ second largest African American population, yet when the people living there go
to a game they see no African Americans playing (Newsroom). Rather than growing up wanting
to be baseball players, children are looking to other sports, such as basketball, to see people like
themselves being successful. This in turn is leading to smaller numbers of African American
children playing baseball with each passing generation.
The third reason baseball is dying among African Americans, and more specifically,
among inner cities, has everything to do with money. When a good high-school baseball player
graduates he has two options, go to college and try to get better, or if he is drafted, go start
playing minor league baseball. Long bus rides, cheap motels, and very meager paychecks are just
a few of the things these players have to look forward to. Either way, the path to the major
leagues will take several years and for most players this goal will never be reached. With money
at the heart of the decision making process, more and more players are playing sports with a
quicker, and more substantial payout, such as basketball. As of 2011, the average NBA salary
was nearly $2 million dollars a year greater than the average Major League Baseball salary. For
a young man trying to escape poverty or just looking for a secure financial future this is a huge
amount of money.
The second social change that is important to review is the emergence of Professional
basketball over the past thirty years. In the early 1900s baseball was America’s sport and Babe
Ruth was its king. There was no viable alternative to baseball for sport’s fans at this point in
history. The only team sport even remotely close to baseball was college football. The idea that
the National Football League would ever reach the kind of popularity it has today was laughable.
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We can see an example of this in the life of Jim Thorpe. This ultra-talented football player had
to play Pro baseball so that he could afford to play Pro football.
At a time of such popularity for baseball, football, and even individual sports such as
boxing, professional basketball had very little popularity to speak of. There were different
professional leagues starting up from year to year, but none of them really drew the attention
necessary to stay in business. In fact club teams such as the Harlem Globetrotters were much
more popular at this time in history (“National Basketball Association”).
Finally, in 1949 a merger between the Basketball Association of America and the
National Basketball League produced the National Basketball Association. (“National Basketball
Association”). This league, which started out with seventeen franchises, experienced contraction
all the way down to eight teams at one point, and today is a very healthy league with thirty
franchises (“National Basketball Association”). However, the NBA’s popularity is still relatively
new. As recently as the 1980’s, the NBA Finals had to be watched on tape delay (London). This
was partly due to small market teams making it to the finals, but it was also caused by a lack of
star power (London).
So why is it different today? There are several reasons why the NBA, and basketball as a
whole has exploded in popularity in recent years. The first reason is a combination of all of the
recent troubles of other sports. Baseball is fresh off of a steroid era that cost the sport a large
portion of its fan base. Football is currently in the midst of mounting controversy over head
injuries and the overall safety of the players. Tiger Woods’ personal issues have single handedly
caused the casual golf fan to lose interest in the sport, and college sports are a mess due to
coaches’ misconduct and recruiting scandals.
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This is not to say that the National Basketball Association does not have its share of
image problems. People still refer to it as the “thug-league,” and many fans were permanently
lost after the infamous “Brawl at the Palace” in 2004, in which an on-court scuffle spilled over
into the stands, and several players were suspended for fighting with fans. However, the league
has substantially cleaned up its act in recent years. Fines for criticism of officials and
suspensions for repeated technical fouls are now policy. National Basketball Association players
are also more involved than ever in community service and charitable organizations. The league
has even cleaned up the image of its individual players, implementing a dress code in 2005 that
requires, among other things, that players sitting with the team but not dressed to play must wear
sport coats (Associated NBA).
The style of the game is also a large component of its popularity. High scoring games, an
up-tempo style, and high-flying dunks are just a few of the characteristics of a normal National
Basketball Association game. Compared to a slow moving game such as baseball and a game
with separate offensive and defensive squads such as football, many find basketball to be a much
more exciting game to play.
So how have these two social changes affected the individual athlete in recent history?
With the decline of baseball’s popularity among young African Americans we are clearly
beginning to see a generation of athletes who prefer to play basketball over baseball. Basketball
was once a winter only sport, but now between Amateur Athletic Union (AAU) leagues and
summer camps it has become a yearlong process. The emergence of professional basketball as a
popular sport places it alongside of professional baseball and football, which in turn gives young
athletes another choice to make. Do I focus all of my time and energy on baseball, football,
basketball, or perhaps some combination of the three?
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This reveals a major social consequence, the young athlete must think like a professional
as soon as he decides to play the game. The pressure to pick one sport and make a living from
that sport is growing all the time. Children use to play three or four sports throughout middle
school and high school, then when they graduated they would have to pick only one to play in
college. This is no longer the case. For example, at the age of twelve years old, my brother
decided to quit playing baseball and to focus his attention on soccer because, as he said, “I won’t
get a baseball scholarship, so I need to focus on a sport I can play in college.” Athletes as young
as fourteen years old are now recruited by major college programs. With young athletes losing
their amateur status at such a young age, the concept of the amateur athlete is dying and will
soon disappear altogether.
A further consequence is that today’s athletes are under enormous media pressures. More
sports are covered today on live television than ever before in history. With the internet and the
explosion of social media, anything an athlete does is known instantly. This can have a
tremendous effect on the athlete, as well as on the fan. Today’s athlete has to be very careful
because every word he says and every move he makes is placed under a microscope and
examined. Any type of misconduct can result in a fine, a lost endorsement, or in some extreme
cases, being cut from the team. So, while the media has brought in enormous amounts of money,
it can also be a pitfall for the athlete that may actually cost him money. This pressure has a
tremendous effect on the athletes psyche.
The media has also had an effect on the average fan. Fans today have a consumer
attitude which only causes the media attention on sports to grow. Fans want to see what they
deem to be the best possible product, and they are willing to pay high dollars for it. This has
created a need for predictability in our sports. Gone are the days of wild characters such as
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Dennis Rodmen. Today’s fan would rather see a clean cut, golden boy athlete perform exactly as
he is expected to, and in no way get into any trouble. After all, the fans are funding his
paycheck, they should get what they want.
This leads us to the third consequence. The money in sports has grown to the point that
making money has replaced playing for a love of the game. Young athletes feel added pressure
to perform because of financial strain. They may be expected to help support the family, and not
making it to the pros is not an option. Not performing well in a game no longer means just a loss
but now could have long-term consequences on the athlete’s future. One bad high school game
could lose an athlete his scholarship, and one bad game in college could cost a player millions of
dollars in the draft. Along with losing their amateur status, athletes are also losing the joy of
playing sports purely for enjoyment.
So, have these social consequences ruined sports? If amateur athletics are dead, are
sports nothing more than just big businesses? I could not disagree with this more. Just because
sports have become professionalized does not mean that they are no longer useful. Recreation,
exercise, and good health are all still positive aspects of sports, and no amount of
professionalization will change that. The loss of the amateur athlete merely means that we are
moving into a new era of sports. I believe that what we have seen in recent years is that sports
have changed not for the better or worse. Rather, they have just shifted, and therefore we must
change the way we participate, view, and even coach sports.
The Role of the Coach
With so many fundamental changes in the world of sports over the past few decades, it is
no surprise that the role of a coach has also undergone a great number of changes. What does
today’s coach look like, how does he function, and what does he do? More importantly, why
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is he necessary today? In the past, middle school and high school coaches were often volunteers
who had full time jobs outside of their sport. While this model can still be found, it is rapidly
being replaced by a new model, one in which coaches are paid to be full time, yearlong coaches.
This is a direct result of the overall professionalization of amateur athletics. The more business
centered sports become, the more extra training is required to coach them, and consequently, the
more pay coaches receive.
In order to understand the modern coach, it is important to understand the professional
side of coaching in today’s sport’s world. The training needed to get a coaching job is much
more extensive today than it was in the past. To become a head coach, there is a general
requirement of a bachelor’s degree; however, this is a bare minimum, and some colleges will not
even hire a coach without a Masters degree (Athletic Coach). Some of the bachelors’ programs
suggested for prospective coaches are physiology, kinesiology, physical education, and sports
science (Bureau 5). While it is possible to get a doctorate in coaching, this has not yet become a
normal step in the path to coaching. What is important is that prospective coaches be trained in
areas such as nutrition, psychology, first aid, management, communication, and media relations,
but most of all, a coach must be trained in the rules and regulations of his sport (Lietz 2).
Besides a Bachelor’s degree, today’s coach may also be required to be certified. Many
high schools require that their coaches be state certified, although this may differ from case to
case (Athletic Coach). However, most private schools do not require any state certification for
their coaches (Bureau, 5). In addition, all coaches must be certified in CPR as a step towards
better player safety. Some coaches may also be required to pass a rules test, and even a vision
exam (Lietz, 2). These are all important aspects of a coach’s training, however, they are not the
ones I find to be most important.
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Possibly the most important type of education or training for a coach in today’s world is
that of experience. As indicated by the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the first level of this
experience is gained by playing the sport for many years. This experience gives a young coach
the confidence needed to make difficult calls because he has been in the game situation before.
Next, a coach should gain experience by volunteering to be a coach at his local YMCA or youth
organization. After this, a coach may find a job with a middle school program. From there, he
must work his way up to the varsity team. For many high school coaches, their careers begin as
an assistant to a high school coach (Bureau of Labor Statistics 6). This is where much of the
crucial learning is done by the hopeful coach (Lietz 2). Along with the educational
requirements, this real life experience has become the norm in what hopeful coaches do to
prepare themselves for a career in coaching, and to make themselves more marketable to
prospective employers.
The first great difficulty presented to a coach by professionalism is that, even with the
increased training required, the job security of a coach has been greatly diminished. In the past
when sports had more of an amateur feel a coach’s job was much more secure than it is today.
It was very common to see a coach stay with one team for his entire career. There are
numerous examples of this both in high school and college, as well as in professional sports.
We see men like Bobby Bowden and Joe Paterno in college football, who coached at their
schools, Florida State University and Penn State University, for 34 and 46 years respectively.
Pat Summit, the greatest women’s basketball coach in history coached at Tennessee for 38
years. We even find examples in professional basketball of coaches such as Jerry Sloan, who
coached the Utah Jazz for 23 seasons.
These coaches were all extremely talented at what they did, but they all had one thing
that most coaches today are not afforded: time. Unlike coaches today, those in the past had
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more time to work with their teams and get the best out of them. For many teams today, a
.500 season is grounds to fire a head coach, while in the past it would take several losing
seasons for a coach to lose his job. Whether it is recruiting and getting a feel for the community
in college sports, or implementing their system and philosophy, and getting the right mix of
players in professional sports, a coach really needs three or four years with a team to be
successful. In some special situations, such as when a coach takes over a historically losing
team, or a team that is fresh off some scandal a coach may need even more time to turn the
team around.
Still, today it is very rare to see a coach stay with one team for his entire career. Rather,
the average coach will work for several different teams during his coaching career. This is a
direct result of our society’s “win now” mentality. The pressure to win is so great that athletic
directors and professional team presidents are often forced to fire coaches, even when the
coach may not be the team’s real problem. A direct result of this is that coaches are more likely
to move around from team to team always looking for a better paycheck, because one bad
season and they could be out of a job. Therefore the idea of being loyal to a team is dying.
Why should a coach be committed to a team long term if the team does not give him the same
commitment?
The pressures felt by today’s coaches are also affecting the ethics of coaching. With the
growing demand to win, and win now, coaches are using every method possible to gain an
advantage. Unfortunately, this often leads to coaches choosing to bend, and in some cases,
blatantly break the rules. When we hear about cheating in sports we usually think of steroids,
human growth hormone, and corked bats. However, there are also several ways for coaches
to unfairly gain an advantage.
The first and most obvious way for a coach to fall into cheating is through recruiting.
There are numerous ways for a coach to unfairly gain an advantage in landing a big time recruit.
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Visiting a recruit outside of the appropriate time period, sending the recruit too many text
messages, calling the recruit too much, or even paying the recruit are all becoming common
occurrences in the yearly recruiting scramble. Some of these violations may sound minor, but if
discovered, they can have damning effects on the guilty program. In 1989, The University of
Kentucky’s basketball team was placed on probation because it was discovered that Dwayne
Casey, an assistant coach, had sent an envelope full of cash to a recruits father (Times). The
penalties handed down were extremely harsh, a two-year post season ban, no televised games
the next season, and a loss of most of their scholarships for two years. However, the program
avoided the “death penalty,” which many people thought they deserved.
This of course mainly affects college coaches, but it is also starting to occur in
professional sports. Tampering, as it is called in the NBA, has become more common with the
recent trend of free agents deciding which team to go to together. Just like in college sports,
there is a free agency period in professional sports when teams are allowed to discuss
contracts. However, there are instances of coaches and teams trying to “recruit”
free agents before this period every year.
Another, and more traditional, way for a coach to gain an unfair advantage in his
sport is by stealing information. A famous example of this was “Spy-gate.” In a 2007 regular
season game, the New England Patriots were caught videotaping opposing coach’s signals from
a sideline location. After an investigation, Coach Bill Belichick was fined $500,000 by the NFL
for this illegal action (2007 National Football League). Although Belichick is often regarded as
the best football coach of our generation, this one act of cheating has tainted his reputation
among many people, and even led some to question if his teams really deserved to win their
three super bowls, or if they were just the results of one coach’s decision to break the rules.
A sometimes forgotten about form of cheating is throwing games. Although we haven’t
had many examples of this lately, this does not mean it does not happen. This is the problem at
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the heart of gambling in sports. We all know the story Pete Rose, and his life-long ban for
betting on baseball. Although he has always sworn to have never bet against his own teams, no
one really knows if this is true, and therefore the integrity of the game is in danger. The increased
pressure to win now leads to an increased temptation to win by any, and all means, including
throwing games. We usually think of cheating as a way to unfairly achieve victory. However, as
stated before, money will always be at the heart of sports. So if losing a game is more
economically rewarding, say because of gambling, then we should not be surprised if a coach
falls prey to it.
We can see that the life of today’s coach is becoming more complicated all the time
because of the immense pressures of recruiting and the win now, win at all cost mentality. There
are three main factors that today’s college coach must learn to deal with. The first and most
difficult, of these pressures is compliance with the NCAA’s recruiting regulations. These rules
focus on how often and by which method prospective student athletes are contacted by college
coaches. The NCAA has recently placed a ban on a coach’s ability to text recruits. The NCAA
also limits when and how often a coach can call a recruit. “Coaches are only allowed to make
one phone call per week to you or your parents (NCAA Recruiting).”
The NCAA is also very strict concerning any benefits a recruit may receive while
visiting a school, or from supporters of a particular program. This is a hot topic in college sports
today. Many people believe that college athletes should be paid for their part in bringing in
revenue to their school, but the NCAA has made it very clear that this is to never take place. So
coaches must guard against the temptation to unfairly lure players to their teams through
monetary promises.
The second factor of recruiting that a coach in today’s game must learn to deal with is the
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prospect of a player leaving school early to play their sport professionally, or the one-and-done
mentality as it is called in basketball. The NBA requires that any player entering its draft must
have been out of high school for one year, while the NFL requires that players be three years
removed from high school upon entering the draft. These rules have changed the way coaches
must form their teams, especially in basketball. In the past when a coach landed a strong recruit
the assumption was that he would be with the team for four seasons. Now, a coach must recruit
with the assumption that he must replace his strong players each season. Coaches like John
Calipari have learned how to use this rule to their advantage when it comes to recruiting. Each
season he recruits a team full of “one-and-done” players, and assuming that they will leave
school after one season, recruits a brand new team of talented players for the next season. While
this model has been very successful for him, the one-and-done culture has made it very difficult
for coaches at smaller, lesser known schools to stay competitive.
Another side of recruiting that is sometimes overlooked but very important for any
successful coach is branding. Today’s society is saturated with information. Social media is
taking over every aspect of our day-to-day lives, especially our sports. For this reason, today’s
coaches have begun to use Facebook, Twitter, Instegram, as well as countless other social media
sights to further the name of their programs. These tools are also becoming extremely important
in regards to recruiting. If a coach can make the teams name, or brand, popular, or “cool,” he has
won half of the recruiting battle. Soon, coaches will be forced to master this new system to stay
competitive, or be left behind.
A coach’s personal life is not immune to the effects of the drastic changes in the world of
sports. We need to see the effect of the increased pressure to win on the coach’s family. Some
people would say “Oh, it must be great to be married to a coach, it looks so glamorous, and they
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get paid so much!” However, this is a dangerous assumption. The majority of coaching positions
are not very well paid, especially for the amount of work required, and although we think of
coaches as superstar celebrities, there are really very few that are well known at all.
First of all, the extreme amount of time and energy required to be a successful head coach
puts a strain on the coach’s marital life. Today, we all too often we hear about coaches’
marriages failing. This could be a caused by many different factors, but chief among them
would have to be the time commitment required of any head coach. On a typical day a head
coach will leave for work before the sun comes up, and not return home till well after it has gone
down again. This makes for a difficult marriage no matter how patient the two partners are. One
of the hardest jobs a coach has today is learning how to manage his marriage and his
commitment to the team.
Secondly, but just as important, is the strain placed on a coach’s children by his time
consuming career. In any family, a parent’s time with his children is very important, but in most
cases, the parent never has enough time for his children. This is even more apparent in the life of
a coach. As was the case with the coach’s spouse, the immense time commitment of being a
coach is very taxing on the lives of children. Unfortunately, the pressures of being a head coach
can often lead to the neglect of his children. It is not out of the ordinary that a normal day for a
coach would start before his children leave for school, and wouldn’t end in most cases until after
they had already gone to bed. One of the most difficult, yet most important jobs for the head
coach is balancing the roles of father and coach. While these circumstances do not make for the
best parent-child relationships, it is interesting to note just how many coach’s children get into,
and even succeed in coaching after growing up in a coaching household.
Finally, the extreme pressures of coaching can have a tremendous effect on the coach’s
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personal health. Many coaches suffer from stress related alignments, anxiety, heart trouble, and
other physical issues. They work long hours, get less than enough rest, and feel the pressures put
on them to win by others. If not handled correctly, these issues can lead to life-long health
problems, and some cases, premature death. Just last year the coaching world lost Rick Majerus
at the age of 64 to heart failure. It was well known that throughout his career, food was often
what brought him peace from the fast-paced life of coaching. However, food is not the only
thing that coaches can abuse.
Unfortunately, some coaches also have the problem of alcohol addiction to battle.
Coaches, just like other people, often start out with just a drink every now and then. This soon
escalates, and before long it is a full-on addiction. If the coach does not realize his problem early
on it can grow to a boiling point at which time the coach may either lose his job, or at the very
least be forced to miss time while getting professional help. This is a growing problem in the
sports world, and for anybody interested in becoming a coach, it is very important to guard
against.
While all of the previous changes we have seen in coaching are important, the most
practical and visible change is that of coaching style. We have seen changes in coaching
strategies throughout history, whether due to rule changes, player’s talents, fan preferences, or
just what is popular at the time. However, these changes are always going and coming in cycles.
The real change we need to understand is the coach’s style, or the way he leads his team. The
leadership style of a coach is the most significant factor of team culture. Without the leadership
of a coach a weak team will fall apart, and a strong team will become strained.
The style of coaching almost universally used in the past was the autocratic style. An
autocratic coach is win-centered, uses a commanding style, and is task-oriented: a dictator.
People perceive this coach in many different ways, some good and some bad. He may be a
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screamer, someone who often argues with officials, or he may be very hard on his players and
act very proud. However, this coach also has a good, strong sense of leadership, and if his team
buys into his style, they will usually be successful. While this style worked for years, and is still
seen in some cases today, it is no longer the norm. It has lost popularity because many athletes
today just do not want to be yelled at, threatened, and demoralized by their coach. More
importantly for younger athletes, most parents don’t appreciate this style.
Today, the democratic coach is rapidly replacing the autocratic coach. A democratic
coach is athlete-centered, people-oriented, and uses a cooperative style. This coach is often
referred to as a player’s coach. This by no means implies that the coach is soft. While he still
pushes his players to work hard and get better, the democratic coach is much more open to the
desires of his players, and is just more approachable than his autocratic counterpart. Everyone
wants to play for a democratic coach, and because of this desire, it is a strong style of leadership.
There are other reasons why this style is popular today. The democratic, player’s coach
views his team more as a family. This warm sense of belonging is appealing to any player. The
team functions with more of the leadership being given to the captains and other players. The
head coach is still in charge of leading the team, but the bulk of this is done in the beginning, and
by design the team begins to police itself later in the season. The democratic coach may still get
in the player’s face and let him know when he has made a mistake; however, the coach is quick
to make it known that any criticism is given to make the player better. This coach truly cares
about his players. When the team wins the coach gives the players all of the credit, and when
they lose he takes all of the blame.
On the other hand, an autocratic coach treats his team more like a business. We play to
win; nothing else matters, and if you can not get it done then the next guy in line will. This
business style is much colder and less friendly than the family atmosphere which the democratic
coach instills. It is the style of coaching which has long been the norm in the NFL. While it is
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changing, some of the older coaches in the league still have this mind set. Of course, we cannot
say that these coaches do not also care for their players. Rather, we could say that they in fact do
care about the players, but what’s good for business comes before everything else,
including personal feelings for individual players.
Another consequence of the change in coaching styles is the effect this style has on
recruiting. Many coaches today are starting to go after the one-and done prospect: that is, the
ultra talented player who everyone knows will only be in college for one year. These coaches
make it no secret that their goal is to get as many players from their teams to the pros as possible
On the other hand, you have the old school coach, who makes it clear that the number
one goal of his team is to succeed in the college ranks. If this means that a superstar has to score
less, so be it. Getting to the pros is just an added bonus to the overall success of the team. This
is by no means a bad mind set for a coach to have, but it is easy to see why it would not be
very popular to an 18 year old kid with dreams of playing in the NBA.
The one area where we can see a negative side of the democratic coach is in his need to
win. Some may say that this “team as family” idea is just another coaching gimmick to get
players to come play for him. Sadly, we see that many coaches today are under so much
pressure to win, that they will do whatever it takes. This loose, player friendly style of coaching
is especially conducive for this win at all costs mentality. The less restricted by rules the players
are, the less restricted by rules the coach is. The coach may use the excuse of “helping out his
family” when trying to justify giving improper benefits to his players.
The answer to this problem is integrity. For some coaches, autocratic or democratic,
ethics still form the basis of their coaching philosophy. Although we might assume that opposite
coaching today is more corrupt than in the past this simply is not the case. The history of
coaching is full of racism, lying, cheating, and personal moral downfalls. No style of coach is
immune. It is the job of the coach to guard against these problems, and to focus on the integrity
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of the game, of his players, and of himself, both on and off the court.
The best way for us to understand the differences between these two types of coaches,
and, more importantly, why the democratic coach is quickly replacing the autocratic coach, is by
looking at real life examples. Any casual sports fan is familiar with the name Bobby Knight. He
is widely recognized as one of the top five coaches in college basketball history. Between Army,
Indiana, and Texas Tech, Knight coached major college basketball for forty-two years. He had
an astonishing win-loss record of 899-374. He led his teams to eleven conference
championships, five Final Fours, and won three NCAA National Championships over his
illustrious career (Bob Knight).
Coach Knight’s style was no secret: he used a very harsh, autocratic style. He demanded
the respect of his players, and even other coaches on his staff, and if this respect was denied,
there would be a price to pay. Knight’s temper may be among the most famous in history. He
could often be seen screaming at officials, players, or anyone else that irked him. Today, an
image often associated with Knight is that of him throwing his chair across the court out of anger
in response to an official’s call. This fiery style worked for Knight, and he used it to guide his
teams to great success, both on and off the court. Nearly all of Knights four year players
graduated, and they generally stayed out of trouble outside of basketball (Puma).
So how is Knight perceived today? While many basketball fans would be quick to point
to his immense success on the court, the majority of fans can’t get past his temper. From angry
outbursts on the court, to awkward media situations, and even physical abuse of players in
practice, Knight is most often viewed today as an egotistical control freak who was too hard on
his players. A perfect example of this was the incident that eventually cost Knight his job, when
an IU freshman greeted the coach with “Hey, what’s up Knight?” Knight grabbed the student by
the arm, and lectured him on respect. This was a violation of Indiana’s zero tolerance policy,
and Knight was soon let go (Knight’s). It is actions like these that make this style of
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coaching unsuccessful in today’s sport’s world.
Bobby Knight was a perfect example of an autocratic coach who stuck with his coaching
style throughout his entire career. While he experienced success over the first part of his career,
his failure to adapt to the changing culture is what forced him out, first of Indiana, then out of
coaching altogether. It is important for us to look at an example of a coach who started as
an autocratic coach, had some success, and then changed to a democratic coach to stay at the top
of the coaching world. What better example is there than the coach of the raining NCAA
basketball champion Louisville Cardinals: Rick Pitino.
Coach Pitino’s career started in 1975 as a graduate assistant at the University of Hawaii.
Over his twenty-eight year career, Pitino has gone 663-235, winning 74% of the games he has
coached. His resume includes eleven conference tournament championships, eighteen trips to
the NCAA tournament, seven Final Fours, and two national championships (Rick College). He
is the only coach in Division I history to lead three different schools to the Final Four. Earlier
this year he was inducted into the Naismith Hall of Fame.
The most interesting aspect of coach Pitino’s career and one of the reasons for his
continued success is the change of styles he has displayed. While serving as the head coach of
Boston, Providence, and finally at Kentucky, Pitino was a loud, proud, intense coach using the
autocratic style. He was known to punish his players for the slightest mistake with hundreds of
stair runs. His offseason condition programs were famous for driving players to the point of
wanting to quit. This style was highly successful for him, as he won the 1996 NCAA
championship while at Kentucky.
What Pitino did next was not surprising, but by no means was it a popular decision. He
allowed his pride to lead him, and he bolted Lexington for the Boston Celtics of the NBA. He
coached the Celtics to a 102-146 record over four forgettable seasons (Rick Professional). After
leaving the NBA, Pitino decided that he needed to come back to college basketball. He also
25. Settle 25
decided that he and his family missed Kentucky, so in 2001 he became the head coach of the
Louisville Cardinals. It has been amazing to watch Pitino over the past twelve seasons at
University of Louisville.
He has become a more soft spoken, easy-going coach who now loves to laugh with his team.
Now when players do things that would have got them sprints in years past Pitino just shrugs and
laughs. Late in his career he has morphed into a clear cut example of a democratic head coach,
and it has paid off immensely. While at Louisville, Pitino has led his team to three Final Fours,
and one National Championship.
So how is Pitino thought about today? Many people, especially Kentucky fans, have not
forgiven him for moving to the NBA rather than staying at UK. However, he is widely viewed
as one of the best coaches in basketball. The fact that he has been able to adapt to the changing
times has added to his popularity. He even recognizes the change in himself. Pitino has been
quoted as saying, “My biggest disappointment isn’t that I didn’t put somebody on the passer in
that 1992 Duke game. It’s that I didn’t live humbly all those years. I try to now (Reilly).” Of all
the changes we have seen in Pitino, I agree that his new found humility has been the most
important. It has made him a more likeable coach, as well as a more successful one.
Another one of the best known, most successful coaches today is John Calipari, the
current head coach of the University of Kentucky. Coach Calipari has experienced great success
so far in his coaching career. He has an overall record of 570-166 as the coach of Massachusetts,
Memphis, and Kentucky. His teams have won eleven conference tournaments, made fourteen
trips to the NCAA tournament, four trips to the Final Four, and his 2012 Kentucky team won the
National Championship (John Calipari). However, another way that Calipari likes to measure
success is by the number of players he helps get to the NBA, and this season, he has eighteen
former players on NBA rosters. This is part of the more modern, player-centered coaching style
that has become the norm in this new era of sports.
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Calipari is one of the best examples of a democratic coach we have ever seen. He is
constantly referring to his team as a family, and about the things they need to do together to get
better. Calipari and his wife are always doing little things to make his players feel loved, and
like a part of a family while they are at college away from their real families. He will yell and
scream at them to prove a point, but will be just as quick to meet them on the sideline with a hug
after the game. Calipari is always preaching teamwork, improvement, and winning. His number
one goal is always that his players get better, and hopefully, make it to the next level.
While Calipari is generally viewed as one of the top coaches in college basketball today,
he still has his critics. Some would say that he is not that great of a coach, but that anyone could
be successful with the best group of freshmen each year. Others might claim that he is
successful, but his system of recruiting one-and-done players is ruining college basketball. Even
with these arguments, the majority of basketball fans realize Calipari’s amazing ability to coach.
His success has come while using the democratic system, which is the coaching style of the day.
On the other side of the spectrum, we often see coaches trying to use old-fashioned,
unpopular coaching styles that are no longer popular, and having little success. Take Billy
Gillispie for example. The now jobless coach started his head coaching career at the University
of Texas El Paso, where he helped to turn around an awful program. After two seasons at UTEP,
he was hired to be the head coach of the Texas A&M Aggies. This is where he experienced the
height of his success as a head coach. Gillispie guided his team to an overall record of 70-26
(Billy Gillispie). This earned him the head coaching position at Kentucky.
While serving as head coach of the University of Kentucky, people began to see the
problems in Gillispe’s style. Rumors started to circulate of harsh punishments, such as forcing
players to ride back to campus on equipment vans rather than on the team bus, kicking a player
off of the team during halftime of a game, and even forcing one player to spend half time locked
in a bathroom stall. These rough tactics did not sit well with Kentucky fans, and neither did
27. Settle 27
loosing, so after two years at Kentucky he was fired. Most recently, Gillispie coached for one
season at Texas Tech, where he led his team to a dismal 8-23 record, before resigning due to
“medical” reasons (Billy Gillispie).
Gillispie is one of, if not the best examples of a modern day autocratic coach. He is well
known for is angry outbursts, his punishment for even the slightest mistakes on the court, and his
very straightforward, business attitude. His players feel like they are at work, not part of a
family. He did experience some success using this system, but only in a small sample. Long-
term wise, he never had a chance. The longer he coached, and refuse to ease up, the worse the
results were. During his one season at Texas Tech, Gillispie faced allegations that he “forced
injured players to practice, bullied players and staffers and generally created an unhealthy
climate inside the program (Eisenberg).”
Today, many people view Gillispie as a sad character, a coach who was behind the times,
but refused to change. It is often said that he would have been a major success as a coach in the
60’s, but was just born several decades too late. His level of success did not out way the
problems with his style. In the end, Gillispie’s inability to adapt, and his down-right
stubbornness coast him his job, and quite possibly, his career.
The Modern Coach
By looking at these specific, real life examples, we have seen which coaching style is
popular today, how it successful, and which style simply does not work, and that this change is a
direct result of the professionalization of amateur sports. With these distinctions in mind, what
roles do today’s coaches play? First, and most importantly, today’s coaches serve as a teachers
and/or mentors, depending on what level of sport is being coached. In youth, high school, and
even some college athletics the coach’s primary responsibility is to teach his athletes the basics
of their sport. A coach must teach these players the rules of the game, as well as proper
technique. Only after this foundation of fundamentals is laid down can a coach start to teach
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strategy, or style.
The coach operating as a mentor is so important, yet it is often an overlooked aspect of
coaching today. Former players turned coaches are very good at this part of coaching. Having
been in the same situations as their players, these coaches are better equipped to offer advice, or
simply sympathize with the players. Mentoring a player can come in the form of on-field,
technical advice, or the off-field sharing of life lessons. Both teaching and mentoring are
important for player development, and a good coach will have a feel for balancing the two.
Beyond mentoring, another important role played by today’s coach is that of a father
figure. As we saw before, a democratic coach molds his team to resemble a family, and the
coach serves as this family’s father. The father coach will punish his players when they do not
do the right thing, on or off the court, but he is quick to show them love and reinforce their
good play with praise. Another part of this aspect of coaching is that many players today come
from single parent, or unstable homes. In many of these cases, a player’s coach may be the only
real role model the player has to look up to and learn from. In this case, serving as a player’s
father figure could very well be the most important job a coach has for these particular players.
In the past, this part of coaching was an accepted part of professional sports, but it was
rarely seen in amateur sports. Many old-school coaches simply did not allow egos to manifest
on their teams. As sports have changed through the years, player’s egos have become a more and
more accepted part of athletics, and today in a sports world where winning trumps everything
else, coaches have to be able to manage these egos. Many people will argue that Coach Phil
Jackson only won eleven championships because he had the best teams with the most talented
rosters. (He coached teams built around Michael Jordan, and Scotty Pippen in Chicago, then later
around Kobe Bryant in Los Angles.) However, this argument overlooks the fact that he had the
ability to manage the egos on his teams and unite them towards the common goal of winning.
Without the ability to manage these egos, he would have had minimal success. It may not
29. Settle 29
always be popular, but ego-management is imperative in today’s player-centered mentality.
A fourth coaching role that is especially visible in the democratic coach is that of a
business consultant. This is the role of today’s coach in which we can see the most evidence of
the over-professionalization of every level of sport. In the past, a coach’s job was to get his team
ready to play the game to the best of their ability, win games, and keeps his players out of trouble
off the court. Today, however, with everything an athlete does from middle school on up being
focused on getting to the next level, coaches have been forced to care about players jobs after
their eligibility has run out. High school coaches are very involved in the recruiting process of
their athletes, and democratic college coaches must be geared towards getting their players
drafted. What talented player would want to play for a coach who did not help them maximize
their draft stock?
The final role played by today’s coach is that of a therapist, more commonly referred to
as a sports psychologist. This has become such an important part of professional athletics that
many teams keep a doctor of Sports Psychology on staff. How much more important is it then
that high school and college teams do the same? During these developmental years players are
especially susceptible to mental and emotional problems that are directly related to their sport.
Most high school and college teams can not afford this, so the head coach has to serve in the
role. Whether it is getting a player through a mental block on the free throw, or helping a player
to face his in-game nervousness, the therapist role of a coach can be extremely important.
These are the roles played by today’s coaches. They are what we expect from our
coaches. However, coaches do not always live up to the expectations placed upon them. This is
when we see the negative side of coaching. Recently, we have seen several instances of abuse of
power by coaches. While serving as the head football coach at The University of Arkansas,
Bobby Petrino was caught in an extramarital affair when he crashed the motorcycle he and his
girlfriend were riding late one night. This would lead to his eventual firing. Why did he allow
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this one transgression to ruin his career? It is because he felt as if he could get away with it
because of his position of power.
A more recent example of this abuse of power was the Rutgers scandal from this past
spring. In April, Mike Rice was fired as the head Men’s basketball coach at Rutgers for abusive
language and actions aimed at players during practice. On the practice videos he could be seen
shoving the players, throwing basketballs at them, and he was heard calling them by homophobic
slurs. He felt as if he had the right to treat his players this way because of his position of power.
However, from outside of the situation it is easy to see that he severely overstepped the boundary
between being a good, tough coach, and an abusive one.
Unfortunately this is not the only negative aspect of coaching. The darkest and most
destructive type of abuse players are susceptible to from their coaches is the abuse of personal
trust. Athletes are entrusted to coaches at younger and younger ages all the time, and these
players give their coaches their total, unconditional trust. This makes for the most efficient
player-coach relationships. Sadly, it also makes for the most dangerous, all too often abusive
player-coach relationships. Over the past year the news has been saturated with the Jerry
Sandusky story. His abuse of his players is one of, if not the greatest tragedies in coaching
history. Because of what he did the whole coaching profession has, and will continue, to change.
More caution must be given to who we entrust our young athletes to. And coaches’ conduct
must be closely monitored. Actions such as those of Sandusky and other abusive coaches have
no place in sports, and they must be eliminated so that coaches are able to repair the broken trust
of athletes. Of all the changes in sports and their impact on the coaching profession, this is by
far the hardest part of the new coach’s job. It is also the most crucial.
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Conclusion
With all the pressure to win, the immense responsibilities, and little job security, why
would anyone want to become a coach? Why do I still want so badly to be a coach? First of
all, I love sports. Not just playing, or watching sports, but the whole idea of sport. I believe
sports are physically, mentally, and emotionally good for the individual. The few bad aspects of
sports are far outweighed by the good. Sports also draw people together and build unity.
After tragedies, such as 9/11 and hurricane Katrina, sports gave people a reason to smile again,
and to believe that life would eventually go back to normal. It had to. After all, the Yankees
and Saints were back on the field. It is at moments like these, as well as international events
such as the Olympics, when we see just how powerful sports can be.
I also love to teach the game to young athletes. My hope is to become a high school,
and possibly one day, a college coach. I really have no interest in coaching professional sports.
At these lower levels I have the opportunity to actually teach the game, as well as have a real
impact on players lives. As I mentioned, a great amount of trust is involved in this, but this
makes the job all the more rewarding.
So have the changes in sports and coaching ruined them for future generations? Not in
the least bit. Just as governments come and go, so do trends in sports. But what is clear across
time and through all these changes is that the good in sports will always outweigh the bad. This
is why we need coaches. Without them, there would be no one to teach the future generations
of athletes. A good coach does not teach the game, he teaches people. Beyond sport skills, the
coach’s real responsibility is teaching sportsmanship, and integrity, in short, character. As the
games change, perhaps for the worse, this role only becomes more important.
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